[Are you willing to listen to the story of a sinner?]
The wind and snow were howling, and endless darkness shrouded the fields. The only campfire was crackling, waving and reflecting the peaceful faces.
At the very edge of the darkness, those brilliant blue lights floated like the aurora.
Hades sat expressionlessly by the campfire, the only light, his back against a fallen tree that had groaned and fallen behind him.
He didn't care about the story of this giant tree, nor did he care about the past of this giant tree. At this moment, billions of beings older and more magnificent than this giant tree were falling - but Hades didn't care at all.
He waited by the campfire with an expressionless face, waiting, in silence.
Until behind him, the sound of snow squeaking was heard.
Hades ignored him. A ragged red-haired man sat down opposite him. As if he had finally found a place to stay, he let out a long sigh and untied the bloody bandages around his eyes. The dirty bandages fell on the snow.
Magnus blinked his one eye, and the bonfire lit up in his eyes, and the dazzling red light covered his original eyes.
The two were speechless. Hades was like a towering ancient tree that really grew in the forest. He just stood there quietly, growing in silence.
Magnus took a deep breath, a wry smile appeared on the corner of his mouth. He scratched his messy hair and picked up a bottle of wine that had fallen in the snow beside the campfire.
It was a flat wine bottle, just the right size for the Primarch to hold in one hand. The dirty oil stains made Magnus's hand sticky. The Scarlet King lifted the bottle curiously and saw a line of small words "Barbarus" on the bottom of the bottle.
[I am not the first one. ]
The Red One muttered to himself in a low voice. He pulled out the cork and a foul, pungent smell rushed straight to his face. Magnus coughed violently a few times and fanned the door in front of him. [I would rather drink Russ's mead.]
As he spoke, Magnus turned around and looked around, as if he was looking for something, but it seemed that he didn't find what he was looking for.
You can do it.
Magnus consoled himself that at least there was something here, and he hesitantly raised the bottle to drink the garbage brewed by Mortarion.
[-vomit-]
Magnus regretted his actions. His tongue had touched the antennae of at least three species of beetles. He cursed the damn Mortarion and decisively closed the bottle cap.
He would rather drink diesel directly than suffer less from the torment on his tongue.
The damn liquid garbage flowed slowly down his esophagus like a ball of sticky fire. Magnus retched and almost wanted to vomit out his stomach.
The toxin corroded the Primarch's defense system and climbed onto his flesh like insects. Magnus shuddered. The internal damage caused by the toxin made the Red King look foggy-minded and his skin red.
Damn Mortarion, Magnus cursed in his heart, internal bleeding and corrosion of internal organs are also a form of drunkenness, right
But it must be said that the wine brewed by the Pale Lord did put Magnus into a "drunk-like" state.
Magnus burped, expelling the poisonous gas from his stomach. He paused and looked around with drunken eyes, but the night was still dark.
[All right,]
Magnus said in self-abandonment,
I have no regrets.
[only…]
He nervously held the bottle tightly in his hand and subconsciously opened it.
Magnus stared at the silent Hades opposite him, like a meditating Hades.
[He still got a part of me, right?]
Magnus took a deep breath and felt a chill climbing up his spine. The thought made him feel as if he was falling into an icy cave. Subconsciously, he took another sip of the poisoned wine.
The Red One began to cough violently and began to curse Mortarion loudly, sharply commenting on the stuff he brewed, which tasted worse than shit.
[He used this thing to force criminals to confess?! ]
Magnus yelled, "He didn't even need to force them to drink it, just uncork it and let them sniff it - I swear in the name of Prospero! This thing will be ranked in the top three most disgusting things in the galaxy!"
Magnus cursed for a long time, but then he felt uncomfortable again, so he drank a few more sips, and this time he was silent.
[All right,]
Magnus muttered to himself. He shook the bottle in his hand, and the half-full bottle of liquid gurgled in his hand.
Magnus carefully placed the bottle back next to the fire and raised his hands, gesturing innocently.
[Leave some for those who come after me - I wonder if I will be the last one, the most unlucky one? ]
Hades naturally did not respond to him. Magnus knew that the "Hades" in front of him was just some boring, symbolic embodiment, and the real Hades was this endless darkness.
[I don’t regret it!]
Magnus suddenly shouted again. After realizing that he was the only intelligent creature here, he felt pretty good.
[I—don’t—regret!]
The Red King spoke loudly, his face was sweaty, and his red skin reflected the firelight.
[I just... I just...]
What was he to say, he scratched his tangled hair in vain? He had nothing to say, and what could he do while Magnus stood there, before the great tree of Fenris
He was simply pulled out once again, from the fate he had originally accepted, and was abruptly thrown into the cruel reality.
but…
Magnus thought that at least this time he was mentally prepared and it wouldn't be like the first time - he stared at Hades, raised his eyebrows, and crossed his arms, as if remembering the scene at the Nikea Conference.
Magnus sighed deeply.
What could he do? He was facing a naive planet soul, a barbarian who pretended to be a barbarian until he actually became one.
Magnus smacked his lips, his eyes inconspicuously glancing at Mortarion's bottle of wine again.
Perhaps he should just continue to wait for death in the wolf's prison. No one had any expectations of him, and everyone was advising him not to take any more action.
Even if he did nothing, the outcome would be the same for Magnus.
He became a puppet of Tzeentch and spent thousand years being cursed by the people.
But, Magnus thought, he couldn't... really do nothing.
He who had faced the Emperor's wisdom knew what all this meant.
The more awake you are, the more desperate you become.
It’s really hard.
Magnus sighed.
[You don’t know how I felt at that time—it’s hard to describe. I seemed to have returned to the night of the destruction of Tizca. I stood in the chaotic night of Tizca, at the foot of the Great Library, trembling as I watched it burn.]
[And I…]
Magnus stared at his palms.
[Realizing that I can’t do much.]
He turned his hand over, as if he had discovered a new hobby, and looked at himself with his restored vision.
Magnus swallowed hard.
[The future is set, the past is set, the prophecy I saw is true, I am still being watched by it, and it even allows me to see all this.]
[These are tough times.]
Magnus said, but then his tone became relaxed and high-pitched.
[But you don't know - I deceived everyone! Everyone - including that self-proclaimed wise being!]
He was smug, spreading his arms and loudly showing off his brilliance, but few beings in the galaxy would notice him.
Magnus said,
He himself was imprisoned, his legion was disbanded, and his descendants were imprisoned.
[Finally, I did it!]
Magnus spoke loudly, but his voice was torn apart by the darkness and disappeared into the distance.
[I did it, I deceived God, at my own expense, with the last goodwill in the warp, no one believed me - of course I knew it, so I deceived them all! ]
Magnus said, and he laughed, laughed madly,
[No one believed in me—not even Chaos—and that was the foundation of my success.]
Magnus laughed loudly and wildly, arms outstretched, he laughed in the darkness, but the last note was a sob,
[I even sacrificed Fenris—]
Magnus said brokenly, [I ended up being the one who crushed hope—it was the only one who believed in me—it was so much like me before, I was just like that… I was just like that…]
Magnus cried out,
[I betrayed it so easily, without a single hesitation—I didn’t even hesitate on this issue!]
He betrayed his former self.
Magnus let out a shattering scream,
[This is why there are no good beings in the subspace, I understand! I understand it completely! I was wrong - you are right! I was wrong!]
He looked at Hades provocatively, but the other side never answered, so the Red King wilted again.
[But what's the use...]
Magnus said softly,
[You never care about these, right?]
I saw it a long time ago.
Magnus shouted, "Damn pragmatists!"
He lowered his head in boredom, feeling a little bored again. The Red One saw the wine bottle. Magnus picked it up without hesitation. He took a big gulp and then threw the bottle away casually.
[Burp!] Magnus said, [Okay! I don't care anymore - my star will be forever covered in dust and despised by millions of people, but I did it, and proved my worth to you damn pragmatists. No noble people can't survive in this dirty land. Noble people have to live with clown masks - I have seen it all.]
Magnus took a deep breath of his own alcoholic breath.
[I have seen my fate. I, Magnus, the Scarlet Sinner, will always be a puppet of God and will never be able to escape.]
He looked towards Hades.
[If you are really Hades, come and cut off my fate! ]
Magnus shouted, his figure floating like a dancing flame, and he disappeared into the vast darkness and was never seen again.
The darkness rustled.
The cold wind brings the last words,
[… Thanks.]
So the fire continued to burn.
No more, yay!
(End of this chapter)